Welcome to another edition of Talsco Weekly

Technical Debt:  Can Technical Debt be qualified as Financial Debt?
Training:  The Smart Way To Train RPG Developers.
Security:  The Risks of Shadow IT and Technical Debt.
Python:  HTML and CSS for Python Developers.

Technical Debt

Can Technical Debt be qualified as Financial Debt?

As modernization projects are in full swing in the IBM i community, technical debt is a hot topic among developers.

This article has an interesting take on Technical Debt in that, “Technical debt can be quantified in various ways, but you cannot precisely quantify the associated financial debt.”

It highlights the original intent of the code vs the quality of the code.

As the IBM i (AS/400) community dives into modernization projects, developers will without a doubt have to think about the intent of the code as well as the quality, and the unintended consequences that resulted from it.

Training

The Smart Way To Train RPG Developers

There seems to be a lot of concern with how we are going to deal with the shortage of RPG Developers in the future.

In reality, the solution is really not that difficult.

Find individuals with natural talent, then train them in RPG.

Sounds simple enough. But, the execution of this is not as straightforward. Learn More

Security

The Risks of Shadow IT and Technical Debt

While we serve IT departments that are over 100+ staff members, the majority of the clients we serve in the IBM i community have anywhere from 2 to 25 staff members.

Regardless of the size, shadow IT and the risks of technical debt are real.

“IT infrastructures contain a growing number of user accounts and devices.”

Thus, “security teams have an overwhelming responsibility for constantly tracking and monitoring these elements.”

What is Shadow IT?:

Shadow IT “is basically any unknown or unmanaged system within an organization’s IT infrastructure, whether it’s cloud accounts, business apps, personal devices, communication channels, or code repositories. Shadow IT exists without the knowledge or attention of the security teams, creating a high risk of data exposure and unauthorized access.”

The top causes of Shadow IT are:

Remote working
Unmanaged Browsers
Third-Party Applications
Fast Production Cycles
Lack of Collaboration and Integration

Shadow IT leads to Technical Debt

The best way to understand the cause-and-effect relationships is to understand the definition of technical debt.

“Technical debt” refers to the cost of additional rework, which is a result of initially choosing an easy or limited solution over a sustainable one.”

Has your organization ever invested in or used technology and overlooked the potential gaps? Or was a short-term solution implemented before considering the long-term ramifications?

Summary:

“Shadow IT is fundamentally caused by a lack of effective and streamlined management.”

“Prioritizing policy-based solutions for application and access control” is the key. It will allow security teams to have oversight of all networks and application systems.

Python

HTML and CSS for Python Developers

With Python becoming more and more popular in IBM i environments, you might want to build a website. In doing so, “there’s no way around HTML and CSS. Almost every website on the Internet is built with HTML markup to structure the page. To make a website look nice, you can style HTML with CSS.

“If you’re interested in web development with Python, then knowing HTML and CSS will help you understand web frameworks like Django and Flask better.”

Check out this tutorial for all the details.

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